


The Cruelest Trick

by bastet_in_april



Category: DCU (Comics)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-29
Updated: 2013-12-29
Packaged: 2018-01-06 13:14:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1107280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bastet_in_april/pseuds/bastet_in_april
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Batgirl isn’t supposed to die this way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Cruelest Trick

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [](http://vespertila.livejournal.com/profile)[**vespertila**](http://vespertila.livejournal.com/)'s [DCU Halloween Chained Challenge](http://vespertila.livejournal.com/114795.html). Unfortunately, this is not spell-checked; I didn’t have time. I will do so later.

Barbara is chained to a chair (isn’t she always, she thinks—but this isn’t her chair.) and Scarecrow is looking far too pleased for it to mean anything good for Barbara’s continued health. She catches a glimpse of the faces of her fellow captives, some beginning to slip into stupors of fear or confusion as the toxin took effect, before all the contours of the room spin and blur together. Abruptly, her reality is replaced with something different.

She is sitting in a chair at her father’s kitchen table, a warm mug of apple cider in her hands, and the soothing rhythmic ticking noise of the wall clock in her ears. The glass fruit bowl in the middle of the table has been of apples and holds brightly colored, individually wrapped candies instead, as well as the toffees Barbara’s father has a secret weakness for. Barbara is on trick-or-treating duty. Halloween in Gotham is the sort of occasion that Commissioner Gordon can rarely be off duty for because all the more unpleasant crazies could never resist coming out to play. (Barbara thinks fleetingly that she ought to be on duty tonight as well, but the incongruity is quickly swept out of her mind.) Gotham isn’t the sort of place where you can leave a bowl of candy out on your front porch rather than being home to dole it out yourself. Not because one kid would likely take the whole bowl, though that happened often enough. Gotham had more unpleasant tricks, like the fifteen razor blades slipped in amongst a bowl of chocolate bars for unwary grasping hands the previous Halloween.

The doorbell rang, shattering Barbara’s reverie, and Barbara got up, abandoning the mug of cider for the candy bowl and toeing on a pair of slippers. “Trick-or-Treat!” came a clamor of high-pitched voices, bombarding her as she opens the door. A lion, a Green Lantern, a cowboy and Batgirl looked up at her hopefully, as a couple of parents and a disgruntled older sibling hovered in the background.

“Well, look at you four!” Barabara grinned in amusement at the little Batgirl in the hand-made costume and held the bowl out for the four kids to peruse. “Two each,” she specifies as the freckled cowboy eyes the treats covetously. Cowboy pouts but quickly scoops up a couple of pieces, Green Lantern picked through the candy carefully until he found a flavor that met his specifications. The lion grabbed a couple of pieces of pieces shyly, before shuffling back from the doorway a bit. Batgirl takes the candy happily and chimes up with a thank you that the other children quickly echo, her blonde pigtails poking up through the makeshift cowl. “Happy Halloween!” Batgirl says and bounds up off the porch, along with the other three children, sticking her tongue out at Cowboy who was the closest to catching up. She pauses once to wave over her shoulder.

“Happy Halloween.” Barbara sighs and takes the bowl back inside. Her mug is going lukewarm, and she thinks about putting it in the microwave, but before she has the chance, the doorbell chimes again. Barbara shrugs and carries the bowl out of the kitchen again. She pulls the door open.

“Trick-or-Treat!” Barbara can feel every hair on her arms stand on end, her eyes wide in shock. Her lungs don’t seem to remember how to work. He grins, unnaturally toothy, and she feels the world dissolve in pain, her knees collapse beneath her, and the sharp crack echoes in her ears, not nearly loud enough to drown out his laughing.

At the end of the drive a tiny, crumpled form is laying. Batgirl’s head is turned towards Barbara, her eyes open, blank and wide. The ends of her pigtails are dipped in the red that is smeared across the pavement. Her cape is tangled around her. She is the most desperately pathetic thing Barbara has ever seen and Barbara hates herself for not being able to keep her safe.

The little girl stares at Barbara, a red stain slowly spreading to obscure the outspread wings of the yellow bat on the girl’s chest, as Barbara strains for every breath through agony. _Batgirl isn’t supposed to die this way._  
 


End file.
